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Population Growth and Urbanization - City and Countryside Today

26 important questions on Population Growth and Urbanization - City and Countryside Today

Why does China have to manage the gravitation to towns and cities that comes along with modernization?

Because in order to feed its population, there need to be enough people in the countryside.

How is China's population distributed over the country?

94% of the total population live in the southeastern parts of China, which contains about 36% of China's total territory. The coastal regions are among the most crowded places in the world. About 6% of the Chinese live in the northwestern part, which accounts to about 64% of the total territory.

What was the aim of the residential registration system which was introduced in 1953?

To control the size of urban population and the volume of rural-urban migration. It helped to manage food and housing supplies, employment, education and other public facilities under the governmental plans.

What was the result of the residential registration system which was introduced in 1953?

The proportion of urban residents in the total population was kept around 20% for a long period (this was much lower than in other nations).

When did the Great Leap Forward begin?

In 1958

What was the result of the Great Leap Forward?

About 20 million rural inhabitants migrated into cities to participate in an urban industrial expansion. However, since the factories were established in a hurry and there were many problems in management and the quality of the labor force, many did not make profits and had to be closed. The government had to tell the 20 million new urban citizens to move back to rural areas.

How did the government control the urban population after the crisis of the Great Leap Forward?

They set up a very restricted system; anyone who wanted to move had to apply for an official transfer. It was difficult to obtain approval for a move from the countryside into a town or city.

What did the government do during the Cultural Revolution with regard to migration?

They sent around 1.2 million city middle-school graduates to rural areas, to army reclamation farms and to urban suburbs for reeducation. The students were compelled to learn from farmers and herders and work as one of them.

What happened to the city middle-school graduates after the Cultural Revolution?

Most returned to their cities of origin; a rural-urban return migration.

What was the result of the new economic reforms in the 1980s with regard to migration?

Migration control loosened. People may travel anywhere in the country nowadays. The number of Chinese living (temporarily) abroad has also increased.

What is the consequence of the lossened migration controls?

The social guarantees and stability of neighbourhoods and communities that the regulations of the government helped to establish are not as firm.

Which factors have led to an increased life expectancy since the 1950s?

Improvements in housing and income have positively impacted people's helath and nutrition.
Improvement of mass education has had an indirect impact on reducing mortality. More children attend school.
Improved health care facilities managed by the government.

Why did the collective health care system lose its financial base after the reforms of the 1980s?

Because all lands and properties were redistributed among peasants.

Describe the rural health care as it is after the reforms of the 1980s.

Peasants pay most of their own health care expenses. The New Rural Cooperative Medical Care System which was introduced in 2005 offers rural dwellers subsidized low-cost insurance, but it only pays 40% of basic coverage. Especially poorer regions suffer from a shortage of doctors and health care services, as local doctors with medical degrees have left their villages and moved to cities to earn higher incomes.

Which factors have made cancer the leading cause of death in China?

Widespread smoking, tainted food, and pollution.

Describe the urban health care as it is after the reforms of the 1980s.

Most urbanites have government-subsidized health insurance, but have to pay around a third of the cost for basic services. State-owned enterprises are facing serious financial problems as they now have to compete with private companies and joint ventures. Benefits no longer cover serious illnesses. In cities many new hospitals are built; their patients have private insurance or pay for most of their care themselves.

What are the consequences of these new forms of health care?

Unlicensed and unregulated illegal clinics, dispensing low-cost advice and drugs of uncertain value have sprung up. Self-help health books have become very popular as well.

What was the housing policy like under the PRC?

All houses and apartment buildings in urban areas were managed by government institutions. The apartments were assigned to employees, who only need to pay a small amount of 'rent'. In rural areas, peasants built houses themselves after obtaining official permission.

How did the government try to improve the urban housing conditions?

The building of tall housing blocks with larger, more modern apartments was accelarated. Since 1998, all workers moving into these apartments must purchase them, while rents for those in older apartments are rising. The final goal of the housing reform is to sell most apartments to the residents with subsidies from the institutions that employ them.

What are rural laborers?

They are people who have moved from villages into cities. They are not counted as permanent urban residents, so they cannot make use of urban schools, subsidized housing and other amenities until they are formally registered as urban systems. This however can take years and means losing their land plots in their village.

The rural laborers often live in makeshift housing they construct themselves or in crude dormitories provided by a temporary employer. City dwellers often shun them.

In Europe and the US there are often long legal battles to acquire property for development projects. This is not the case in China, why not?

In China, most of the land is not private and thus available for conversion to public uses. This also means that entire city streets and blocks are torn down to make way for public development projects.

What are the advantages and disadvantages of the huge public development projects for which entire cities are even rebuilt?

Advantages: better housing and hygiene.

Disadvantages: it has scattered the population, made it harder to maintain neighbourhood activities, many historic buildings have been destroyed. Much farmland has also been destroyed.

What has been the official strategy of the government on future urbanization since 1980?

To control the population size of large cities, properly develop middle-sized cities, and encourage the development of small cities and towns.

Why were small towns considered important by experts with regard to the stategy on future urbanization?

Small towns could absorb the surplus of rural laborers by developing township enterprises. They could depend on their own revenues without much provincial or national governmental investment.

How is the actual strategy different from the official strategy of future urbanization in China?

Instead of controling the population size of large cities and properly developing smaller cities, much emphasis has actually been on developing the large cities.

Why is it difficult to come to grips with the problems related to urbanization?

The government often changes its definitions of what cities, towns etc. are. These definitions are often changed to accommodate policy needs.

The question on the page originate from the summary of the following study material:

Understanding contemporary China | 9781588268440 | Robert E Gamer

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Population Growth and Urbanization - City and Countryside Today

26 important questions on Population Growth and Urbanization - City and Countryside Today

Why does China have to manage the gravitation to towns and cities that comes along with modernization?

How is China's population distributed over the country?

What was the aim of the residential registration system which was introduced in 1953?

What was the result of the residential registration system which was introduced in 1953?

When did the Great Leap Forward begin?

What was the result of the Great Leap Forward?

How did the government control the urban population after the crisis of the Great Leap Forward?

What did the government do during the Cultural Revolution with regard to migration?

What happened to the city middle-school graduates after the Cultural Revolution?

What was the result of the new economic reforms in the 1980s with regard to migration?

What is the consequence of the lossened migration controls?

Which factors have led to an increased life expectancy since the 1950s?

Why did the collective health care system lose its financial base after the reforms of the 1980s?

Describe the rural health care as it is after the reforms of the 1980s.

Which factors have made cancer the leading cause of death in China?

Describe the urban health care as it is after the reforms of the 1980s.

What are the consequences of these new forms of health care?

What was the housing policy like under the PRC?

How did the government try to improve the urban housing conditions?

What are rural laborers?

In Europe and the US there are often long legal battles to acquire property for development projects. This is not the case in China, why not?

What are the advantages and disadvantages of the huge public development projects for which entire cities are even rebuilt?

What has been the official strategy of the government on future urbanization since 1980?

Why were small towns considered important by experts with regard to the stategy on future urbanization?

How is the actual strategy different from the official strategy of future urbanization in China?

Why is it difficult to come to grips with the problems related to urbanization?

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